Still Here
by Chloes-Cheese
Summary: Toni wakes up from a nightmare that she's having a hard time shaking. Jed is there to get her through it. Confessions are made and things develop from there. Oneshot. Toni/Jed Basically my little AU on how I would have liked the movie to end.


**Disclaimer: Nothing is mine. Obviously or else this is what I would have had happen.**

**Author's Note: So I finally got the chance to see Red Dawn this weekend and I loved it. Jed especially. So of course I was upset by what happened but I kind of saw it coming. This is something that I just couldn't get out of my brain and I just had to write. Because I needed to fix what happened for my own little happy bubble. Haha. Like it or not, this is just something I needed and I hope someone else takes enjoyment from it.**

**Also please forgive me as this is unbeta'd.**

One minute Jed was walking towards her, a suggestive smile on his face, the next he was on the ground with a bullet in his skull at her feet. And she just couldn't comprehend it.

Everything was moving so fast and yet so slow that it all stood still at the same time. Toni couldn't help the sob that tore through her as she sunk to the ground.

Matt was yelling directions but she heard none of it. She could only see Jed. Her Jed, lying lifeless, never again to give her that grin that made something inside her melt. She knew better than this, knew better than to fall apart when they lost someone.

But this wasn't anyone. This was Jed.

Jed whom she'd basically been pining for her entire life. Jed who she cut her hair for in middle school. Jed whom she'd always thought of when the war was mentioned ever since he went away. Jed who was the reason any of them were still alive in the first place.

Some far away part of her was shouting alongside Matty that she needed to move, that she needed to remember their training and run. To find cover and shoot the bastards who had done this down but the greater part of her was consumed with the black hole of losing the only guy she'd ever really given a crap about.

But she had to move. She had to leave. Leave Jed. And it hurt but she let the younger Eckert pull her way as she tried to think straight through her grief. And every step was a punch in the gut. What happened next was all just a blur, she knew objectively they were running to get to the helicopter and deliver the communication device to safe hands but she was under a dark cloud and she couldn't really process any of it.

But when they stopped and discovered the tracker in Daryl, something in Toni just snapped. Despite the months she'd spent with this kid and the fact that she knew he would never do anything like this on purpose; she wanted him to pay. She wanted to strangle him to make him feel all of the pain she felt. She just wanted to shout at him because it was his fault. It was his fault they lost their leader.

Later she would probably regret snapping at him especially when he decided to stay behind to not give away their position. But not now.

Now she felt only a savage sort of satisfaction that he would pay for what happened to Jed. This wasn't who she was and if she was in her right mind she would feel ashamed of her tantrums and for losing it but right now she couldn't think any of that. She was a hurt animal whose only instinct was to get away, to survive to lick their wounds in peace.

And she did at the first chance she got. Hours after they dropped Tanner and Smith off at the helicopter and Matt had found a place for them to camp for the night, she slipped away. Robert, who was standing watch at the camp fire, must have seen her but he had the decency to not stop her when she had to disappear in the woods. He'd just had to leave his best friend behind so he understood some of her pain.

After trying to hold it together for most of the day she finally let it all out. She was far enough into the woods that no one could hear her screams of anguish. She shouted and she cried. She then went to the largest tree she could find and started punching it. She'd gotten a couple good blows in but she couldn't feel any of it. At her fifth strike, she poured all of her strength into a particularly vicious yell just but before she could finish she found herself jolting awake.

Toni couldn't help the gasp at the abrupt change in scenery. She wasn't in the woods anymore. Rather she was back in the abandoned apartment where they had regrouped after successfully retrieving the radio device. She was breathing hard, like the time when she had nearly drowned at the lake when she was eleven and Mr. Eckert had finally pulled her to the surface but her lungs ached and her head was on fire. It felt exactly like that.

She was disoriented and sat up immediately, staring around, trying to assess her surroundings. Matt and Erica lay off to the side, holding hands. The Free America soldiers were keeping watch by the windows with their rifles, Robert was sitting up against the wall, staring dejectedly into space after a glance in her direction at her erratic breathing. And there was Jed, laying a few feet from her. He turned, sitting up slightly in response to her panic with a concerned look on his face but it was more than Toni could handle. With no explanation for her sudden alarm, she threw off her blanket and left the room very quickly, leaving the apartment they had camped in, in favor of one down the hall from them.

Once inside, she hurried to the bedroom, sliding down to sit against the wall as soon as she was in the room, as far from the group as she could be. She couldn't help the panicked hyperventilating that came from her as she tried to process what just happened.

Was that world a dream or was this one? She didn't know. Weren't you supposed to pinch yourself to see if it was a dream or not? She thought so but she couldn't make her hand move to test the theory out. She was afraid. She was afraid that it wouldn't hurt and that she'd have to wake up back in that hell where Jed was killed right in front of her.

She tried to remember what actually happened. She tried to track the differences between this world and that one.

The tracker.

In that one Daryl had come back and they patched him up only to have him lead the enemy straight to their hide out where a sniper took Jed out. In this one Daryl was the one taken out while they tried to retrieve the Korean's green box. And Toni felt dizzy and confused and like she might throw up but she couldn't move because she was terrified that this one wasn't the real one.

So caught up in her fear, she didn't hear the light footsteps as they entered her apartment.

"Hey," a deep voice spoke suddenly from beside her in the doorway.

Toni jumped, scooting away about a foot to stare up at the newcomer.

It was Jed. Jed with his kind blue eyes and worried expression.

He held out his hands in a non-threatening gesture as he eased down to squat beside her, saying softly, "Hey hey, it's okay, It's alright I was just coming to see if you were okay."

Toni couldn't speak, she just shook. The part of that was still sound of mind hated what that dream had done to her. All of her strength and fire just went out like candle and instead she was reduced to one of those delicate shuddering females in horror movies she used to make fun of.

But Jed just understood that she couldn't speak, so he sat down beside her against the wall and wrapped his strong arms around her and just held her, one hand stroking her hair and made comforting shushing noises as she continued to sob in failed attempts to calm her breathing.

She had no idea how long they sat in the dark like that. But eventually her breathing evened out and she was able to think of that other possibility without breaking out in fresh sobs. But Jed said nothing. He didn't ask questions, he didn't tell her to get her act together. He didn't shift anxiously or try to leave. He just held her and helped her pull herself together.

Taking a deep, Toni finally brought herself to sit up straight even though pulling her head off of his shoulder was harder than she would ever admit. She was just so embarrassed that she had to explain, had to offer some reason for why had just lost it so completely. It was difficult to meet him in the eyes after her little break down but his calm blue eyes bore no sign of resentment or judgment of any kind, just a deep patience that she didn't understand how he could still have after all this time.

"I'm so sorry." She said clearing her throat looking away once more as she nervously tucked her knees up to hug them to her torso.

"Don't be," he said understandingly, his gaze never leaving her. "You've held it together for months. You've been one of the strongest of us. But we've all been through a lot. You are entitled to freaking out every once in a while."

"I just feel foolish." She maintained, staring at her feet, "I didn't want to let you guys down."

"You're human," he countered, gripping her chin gently and pulling it up to make her look him in the eye, "I'm not mad. I'm just worried."

She still felt like an idiot but she could tell he wasn't lying to her and though it made her feel more dumb, Toni knew she had to tell him what happened and hoped that maybe if she said it out loud it would stop festering like poison in her mind.

"I had a nightmare," she finally admitted, looking him square in the face, gauging his expression for any trace of judgment but when she found none she kept going despite the difficulty she was having finding the words to explain it. "Daryl survived but… but they found us and they… they killed you. And I can't tell if I'm dreaming or not. And I'm terrified because I don't know if I'm going to wake up and be back there or not. And it's stupid because at the rate we're going we're all going to die soon but I can't stand it if it's you. In that world I lost it for a while. Matt kept us going and we did what we had to but I don't want to be there. I don't want to keep going there. And that's probably not what you want to hear but I need to be here and I need you to be alive, okay?"

He didn't say anything for a good long minute and Toni began to wish she'd never said anything, wish that he'd never followed her to see her so weak, to hear such things but she couldn't take it back. Just when she was ready to stand up and leave just so she wouldn't have to face the silence anymore, he spoke up.

"I get it." He began quietly, "That first day after we escaped I was trying to get some rest because I didn't know when I'd next get the chance and I had a nightmare too. I should have been worrying about my dad or keeping Matt safe when he was so determined to get Erica back but instead I thought about you. I don't know how long it had been since we had seen each other but seeing you at the bar, I remembered a lot of things. Things that I'd tried to get over when I lost my mom and joined the Marines. But I had a nightmare that I wasn't fast enough. You tried to jump in the back of the truck when we were escaping town and you were hit. And I couldn't say anything about it but it scared me. It scared me because it could have easily happened. I knew you were a strong one and wouldn't go down without a fight and I was worried that because we couldn't get to you, they would. When you showed up that night with Danny I was so relieved. I didn't tell you and perhaps I should have but I thought that it might make it harder. That when something does happen to one of us, that it'd be worse. But what if I was wrong?"

Toni just stared at him, while she wouldn't exactly call Jed a simple grunt, she couldn't name a single time in which he had ever said such a long speech nor so eloquently. She knew she should say something what with the honest look in his beautiful eyes as he waited for a reply, but for the life of her she could not believe her ears. Was he saying what she thought he was saying? Did that mean what she thought it meant?

I mean sure they had nearly kissed by the lake that one time but since it hadn't happened again, she'd assumed he'd just wanted to forget it. Though they'd been on the run for about six months, nothing had ever happened between them and she just assumed nothing was ever going to. I mean they were the oldest and she sort of figured that it was their job to keep it together, to guide the others and to put aside whatever she wanted to happen between them and focus on keeping the group alive.

But sitting here in the dark so close to him after their latest and perhaps biggest victory with him having just said that, she wasn't sure how much she cared about all that. She still couldn't be sure what was real or not but having the memory and the possibility of a world without Jed she ran out of excuses for why not to just go for it already. Even if she woke up in five minutes, she'd rather have the memory of five minutes of actually being with Jed if she had to face an eternity without him.

"Then let's make up for it now," she finally replied, and with all embarrassment gone, she put her knees down and reached forward and kissed him without hesitation.

Jed was momentarily surprised, worried that her silence meant that she'd decided that he wasn't wrong but he forgot that very quickly because she was kissing him. He couldn't count the number of times he'd thought about doing this over the years and it seemed so strange that this would be how it would happen but at the same time it made complete sense. They were both very stubborn and very practical and strong willed and it would have to take something like the two of them both sharing the same fears and finally revealing how they both felt mutually in order for anything to happen.

And all Jed could think as his hand found the back of her neck and pulled her closer to deepen the kiss was _Finally._

She adjusted sit on her knees in front of him, her hands finally grasping the short blonde locks she'd been fantasizing about running her hands through for longer than she'd care to admit. She needed to be closer, to deepen the kiss, to get some kind of assurance that this was real and that she wasn't still dreaming alone in the woods. So her hands quickly removed his thick jacket as his tongue found his way into her mouth. And they were so close and their hearts were racing and it was so much she'd been waiting for but Toni needed more. After having feelings for him for more than half of her life, she was not going to settle for playing it safe or being coy. She'd had more than her fair share of that so without hesitations, her hands proceeded to creep down his broad shoulders and strong chest to the hem of his T-shirt and began to inch it up.

Jed paused then, pulling back and gasping for breath, holding her hands and looking her in the eyes, "Wait, Toni. Are you sure? Are you just doing this because of the nightmare?"

Toni took in a deep breath to stabilize her breathing, "It took the nightmare to wake me up. We're all going to die someday, hell it could even be tomorrow and I do not want to wake up one day regretting not acting on what I know I've been wanting to do for months. Do you?"

Jed didn't have any more complaints, he just needed to know that she was sure and wasn't acting in some extended panic. So he let her hands go and helped her remove his shirt. And Toni most definitely enjoyed the view. Sure, she'd seen him shirtless before, you don't live in such close proximity in such crude living arrangements without it happening from time to time, but this was different. This wasn't a stolen glance through the trees or a necessary occurrence when treating injuries. This was all for her. And Toni relished the opportunity, her eyes drinking in the sight. Momentarily satisfied, their lips met once more as they increased space. His large, calloused hands removed her over shirt with deft ease before running them down her bare arms.

And taking this step with him with the unrestrained passion that she'd been holding back for years, Toni felt like she could handle whatever happened next. She knew in their chaotic life that the likelihood of surviving this hell was highly unlikely. She honestly didn't see a happy ending for them. She knew a white picket fence and kids and marriage and a happily ever after were out of the question but she was okay with that. They'd said her peace and they'd be together as long as they could. So despite the fact that she could never have imagined this was how her finally getting together with Jed would go down it fit with how they had to live now so she had no regrets. As they embraced each other deeply, taking that crucial step in removing some of the barriers between them, it felt right.

It was all that Toni had been craving and more.

And when she awoke in his arms laying on their discarded clothing in the empty room, she felt an intense wave of relief at having woken up to the sight of his gorgeous face in the sunlight instead of alone in those godforsaken woods. She reached her hand out to stroke his face, feeling more reassured each moment from the simple feel of his stubble under her fingertips. His brow creased and she quickly pulled her hand away, worried that she woke him. But it appeared that the damage was done because his eyes opened to meet her gaze blearily.

She knew she looked like a moron but she couldn't help but just stare at the miracle of him, the proof that last night had actually happened.

"What?" he said groggily, trying to find the trace of the strange expression on her face.

"It was real." She said quietly, her hand moving to rest on his chest, content to just feel him beside her.

His face cleared as he understood what she was saying.

"You were still worried you were dreaming." It wasn't a question.

She didn't reply but she didn't need to, she just absentmindedly stared at his chest.

He brought his hand up to stroke her hair and she honestly would love to get used to that.

"It'll happen one day." He simply said, looking at the ceiling as his hand continued its movements, "We'll try putting it off but it will happen."

"I know." She said reluctantly. She wanted to pretend that it wasn't a possibility, that they could just be together without the threat of possible impending death looming over them but she was too much of a realist for that.

"You have to promise me that if I die first you'll keep it together. I need to know that the rest will be taken care of. Matt's learning but he'll need you still. SO you have to promise me Toni." He said very calmly as though this was something he'd thought about saying many times.

She knew from experience that it would suck and would likely be the hardest thing she would ever have to do. To not lay down in die and just give up on everything like she had nearly done in the dream but Jed was right. The others would need her. Erica needed her to be around especially.

"I promise." She said quietly and she knew she would have to live up to it. She could never say no to Jed growing up and this was no exception. This was in fact more important than anything he'd ever asked of her. This was something he could only trust her to do.

Jed let out a deep sigh of relief at her words, "Thank you."

She didn't say anything else, instead she scooted over closer on her side, resting her head against his shoulder. She knew they would have to move soon to get Tanner and Smith on their way but she needed this moment. This moment of quiet, this moment of bliss to store up until they could be intimate again, which may in fact never come. So she closed her eyes and memorized the fell of him warm beside her and was just thankful that they had gotten this chance to finally admit how they felt.

Because no matter what would happen next they would always have that night and that would make getting up each day that much more bearable for both of them.

**Author's Note: And there we have it, my own little AU solution for the movie's ending. I'm sorry if you guys wanted something racier but um yeah I don't know how to write that but if you wanna go ahead and fill in the blank I left in this oneshot go ahead.**

**I just yes. Jed/Toni happy good times is good.**

**Please let me know if you guys like because I am kind of nervous about this one so please review!**


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